


Golgotha Tenement Blues

by evilkat



Category: Captain America (Movies), Captain America - All Media Types
Genre: Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, M/M, Revenge, crossover with The Crow
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2015-08-04
Updated: 2016-08-03
Packaged: 2018-04-12 20:57:38
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence, Rape/Non-Con
Chapters: 3
Words: 5,272
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/4494456
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/evilkat/pseuds/evilkat
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>People once believed that when someone died a crow carried their soul to the land of the dead.  But sometimes...sometimes the crow can bring that soul back to set the wrong things right.</p>
<p>Or the crossover with The Crow that has probably been done before, but here is my take.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Dream the Crow-black Dream

**Author's Note:**

> Just like the summary says, no new ground covered, I'm sure, but this idea took hold and wouldn't let go. I am going to be taking ideas from the 1994 movie as well as the original graphic novel by James O'Barr with my own twist thrown into the mix. 
> 
> The title of this story comes for the song of the same name by Machines of Loving Grace.
> 
> The title of this chapter come from "Burn" by The Cure.

The wind rushed past his ears with a deafening scream, cancelling out the noise from the city. His brain had long enough to process one final thought before reaching the end of his unexpected four story swan dive- _no, not like this._

And then there was pain the likes of which he had never felt. That was to be expected when a body was hurled out of a window onto the sidewalk below. But it was as instantaneous as the blink of a god’s eye and then there was nothing but black. It bubbled up over him, curling around his limbs like a snake, and pulled him down, down, down into the inky darkness where he floated, lighter than ether. He reached up with his right hand to touch his face to make sure that his eyes were open. His left arm wouldn’t move, but he couldn’t be bothered with that right now. 

So, this was the way the world ended for James Buchanan Barnes. Not with a bang or a whimper, but with more of a dull, wet crunch. 

_Where am I?_

There was a tiny pinpoint of light below him that quickly grew smaller the longer he stared at it as if he were moving away from it. If he were an asteroid hurtling towards the edge of the universe, he imagined that this is what it would probably feel like. 

_Wait. What happened to me? I remember…I remember…Steve! Where is Steve? What happened—_

_//Shhhh…relax.//_

A lusciously baritone voice crooned softly in the emptiness. 

_Who are you? What’s going on? Where is Steve?_

He felt a ripple of annoyance and heard a sigh. Not with his ears, the voice was inside his head. 

_//You really need to calm down.//_

_Calm down? What the fuck is going on h—_

_//Look, I get it. It’s all very upsetting, but you need to calm down and rest. You have work to do.//_

_Steve! I need to find Steve._

_//Hush. He has his own journey to take. We’re talking about you now. You need to rest.//_

_But…_

_//James, you’re not listening…sleep.//_

It was oddly comforting that the voice knew his name and he was so very tired. The black was pulling him down again and this time he didn’t fight it.

_Am I dead?_

_//Don’t worry about that. It’s just a technicality right now.//_

He laughed at that. Death was just a technicality now. He’s had some bizarre dreams before, but this one took the cake for sure.

That was the last thought he had as his old life slipped away and his new life began to germinate inside this shadowy womb.


	2. Dead Souls

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Someone take these dreams away  
> That point me to another day  
> A duel of personalities  
> That stretch all true reality  
> They keep calling me....
> 
> -"Dead Souls" by Joy Division as covered by Nine Inch Nails.

_//Hey//_

….

_//Hey, wake up. It’s time.//_

_Time for what?_

_//Time for you to go to work. You have a job to do, now BREATHE!//_

The bottom dropped out of the world and, once again, he was falling at supersonic speed. The tiny pinpoint of light was rushing up to meet him, blazing in intensity as he got closer. It grew brighter and brighter still until there was a quick flash of dread that he would be incinerated. Light that intense had to be hot and soon there was nothing but the blinding glow.

And then, suddenly, it was black once again. 

He found that he was laying flat on his back with his right arm resting on his chest. The sounds of his breathing were exceptionally loud wherever he was. Once again he lifted his hand up to touch his eyes to make sure that they were open. His left arm wouldn’t move when he tried and when he reached over with his right, his hand closed around an empty sleeve.

“As Gregor Samsa awoke one morning from uneasy dreams he found himself transformed…” he quoted sarcastically into the empty air. 

_//You had better get a move on. You don’t have too much air left.//_

“Where am I supposed to be going?” 

There was that annoyed sigh again.

_//You can’t stay here. You need to push upwards with all your strength.//_

“Uh, I apparently only have one arm?” He was slightly amused by the fact that this particular revelation didn’t bother him as much as one would think. His head felt like it was stuffed with cotton. 

_//It doesn’t matter. You’re much stronger than you were before. Now-push!//_

James shrugged. “If you say so.” 

_//I know so. Get going!//_

So, he did. Reaching up with his right hand, he moved slowly until he touched something soft and silky less than a foot above his face that gave way to something harder beneath. He kept applying more pressure until he heard wood starting to creak. 

_//Yes, keep going.//_

He pushed harder and the wood began to pop and snap. Dirt rained down onto his face and he flinched badly.

_//No! Don’t stop. Keep pushing!//_

James heaved with all his might and the wood barrier gave way in an avalanche of wet dirt. It quickly filled his mouth and nose, choking off the little air he had. Despite finding himself in such a dire situation, he didn’t panic. An odd calm settled over him and even though the soil above him was quite heavy, it wasn’t densely packed. In one fluid motion he was able to sit upright and get his legs underneath him to practically launch himself upwards. Clawing his way with one hand, he burst through the surface like Aphrodite born from the mud. 

He gasped the sweet night air and hacked the putrid smelling muck from his lungs. When his body finished its convulsions, he dragged himself the rest of the way out of the ground. He found his legs were rubbery when he stood on them and managed to make it only a few steps before they gave out and he latched onto the nearby limb of a small dogwood tree to keep from crashing back down to the ground. 

He turned his eyes upwards to the nighttime sky. It was raining. His breath plumed a cloud when he exhaled, but he didn’t feel cold at all. He could feel the cool dampness sinking into his skin, but other than his body registering the temperature, it didn’t affect him. Then he saw it. Silhouetted against the bright harvest moon, a shape flew towards him. James watched as a large crow, black as pitch, landed on the branch next to him. Its wings made no sound. If it weren’t for the way its eyes glinted from the low light, he would have thought it a hallucination. Until it cawed…loudly. 

_//Hello James. It’s nice to finally see you…in a manner of speaking.//_

It was the same voice that he had been hearing in his head. It was coming from this bird. Or not, really. The bird didn’t make a sound, but the voice was still inside his head.

_//Yes, you are correct. I’m inside your head, James and you are inside mine.//_

“What does that even mean?” he said out loud to the crow.

_//Oh, time for show and tell already? Alright…close your eyes.//_

James eyed the bird skeptically for a moment before he complied. The minute his eyes slipped shut, he was greeted by the sight of himself clinging to a tree. “What the fuck?” he screeched, staggering backwards on unsteady legs before sitting down hard on the ground. 

_//I know it’s weird the first time, but you’ll get used to it. If you think that’s impressive, wait until you see this.// ___

__He closed his eyes again as the crow took flight. It was like watching himself on television, but sharper. As the image of himself became smaller as the crow spiraled higher and higher, he found that he could still make out the finer details like the texture of the tree bark and the silver hoop earring in his left ear. Now given the benefit of an aerial view, he discovered that his location was that of a cemetery. He could easily make out all of the rows of headstones and the larger mausoleums. His stomach lurched as the crow darted to the right and looped around to land back on the same low branch as before._ _

__James had once gone on a virtual rollercoaster ride at a mall. Even though the whole contraption moved in time to the video, you didn’t actually do any of the loops and big drops no matter how much your brain thought you did. This was very reminiscent of that. Even though he wasn’t the one who flying, he felt the pull of gravity break in the pit of his stomach as though he was. He could feel the crow smirking._ _

___//Come on, you can admit it. There’s no one here but us. That was pretty awesome.//_ _ _

__“Yeah, I guess.”_ _

___//Hard to please, aren’t you? Well then, how about this?//_ _ _

__The bird cocked its head to the left and quickly to the right. James felt his lungs tighten with a sudden sense of impending doom when the crow stretched its body as tall as it could make itself and began flapping its wings. When it cawed, James felt it reverberate through his entire body._ _

__“What the-“ was all he could get out before the pain started. It began small, like how a burn wound would before the intensity steadily grew. The suit jacket and dress shirt that was underneath were in tatters and seemed only to still be on him through sheer force of will. James grabbed them both in his right hand and pulled. They came away from his torso easily. The jagged stump that was revealed made him gasp. But then, right before his eyes, long black protrusions began to burst out of what was left of his arm. It felt like his veins were injected with lava. He could hear his own flesh tearing as more and more of these black spikes shot out from his arm._ _

__He screamed then, with his mouth wide as all the agony he could offer poured out of it. The black spikes swirled in double helixes until a form could be recognized. When his voice gave out, James watched in mute horror as a jet-black humerus bone coiled down into an elbow joint, into a radius and ulna, and all the way down to a wrist and an actual hand with fingers. What he thought were spikes unfurled from their sheathing as downy feathers that wrapped around the newly-formed bones like bandages. The pain began to taper off slowly and he could feel his heartbeat slowing with each gulp of air._ _

_//Try it out.//_

__To his utter amazement, the arm made a fist when he tried. The feather-bandages split open when James’s flexed to reveal a pale-skinned and muscled arm that looked almost exactly like his old one. There was one notable difference, however. His old arm didn’t come equipped with talon tipped claws, his new one did._ _

__// Sorry, I can’t make it like it was. I have to work with what I’ve got.//_ _

__“It’s okay,” James offered as if he had any right to be choosy and reached out to brush away the rest of the feathers with his other arm._ _

_//I think you’ll be happy with my handiwork. This one is better than your old one…stronger. You’re going to need it.//_

__“Yeah?” James barely spent a glance in the crow’s direction. He was still too mystified by the fact that he just re-grew an arm._ _

__//Yeah. Now, come on it’s time to go.//_ _

__Cradling the new arm to his chest, he rose on still unsteady feet. When he attempted to take a step, his knees buckled and he had to throw out an arm to keep himself from going down. The crow took off towards the main gate of the cemetery. James took another step and then another. His legs shaking like a newborn calf._ _

__“Why are my legs so weak?”_ _

_//You haven’t used them in a year.//_

__A year? Had it been that long? The crow was waiting, perched on the huge, iron gate while James stumbled along. The more he walked, the easier it became and when he finally caught up to the bird, he was only slightly limping. The crow took off down a nearby alley as soon as he was out of the cemetery and onto the street._ _

__“Where are we going?” he asked as he did his best to keep up. It had only now occurred to him to question what exactly was happening here._ _

_//Home.//_

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Feedback is always appreciated.


	3. Just Paint Your Face

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> In this chapter we meet the bad guys. Rumlow is T-Bird, Rollins is Fun Boy, Sitwell is Skank, and since I couldn't match him up with anyone Tin-Tin is the same character from the movie. If you are unfamiliar with the movie, please treat him like an original character. Also, in this chapter there is talk and imagery of bad things like violence and rape so proceed with caution if you are sensitive.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> "Just paint your face," the shadows smiled  
> Slipping me away from you.  
> Oh, it doesn't matter how you hide  
> Find you if we're wanting to.  
> "Burn" -The Cure

Brock Rumlow watched his team destroy the old Mom and Pop arcade.  This place had been in the neighborhood since the early Eighties from the look of most of the games.  Hell, he remembered playing most of them back when he was a kid.  Centipede.  Spy Hunter.  Gauntlet.  There was even an old original Star Trek series pinball game that had to be from the Sixties. Games used to cost only twenty-five cents and he and his friends could play for hours on a few bucks.  Good times. 

 

“Yo, Brock!” Rollins called, pulling the other man from his nostalgia.  “It’s ‘Light my fire’ time.”

 

“Then let’s get the fuck outta here,” he replied.  “Come on, Tin-Tin, quit stalling.”

 

“Be right there, boss,” the dark-skinned man said as he took one last swing of his wooden baseball bat to the neon “Open” sign.  “Closed for business…indefinitely,” he cackled and ran off to catch up with the others.

 

Rumlow waited until his two fellow henchmen were out on the street before flipping on the homemade detonator to activate it.  If all went well, in a few hours Playtown Arcade would fall down and go boom.  With a few household chemicals mixed into proper proportions and a hack job for a timing device, the arson investigators should rule the whole thing as an insurance scam perpetrated by the owners.

 

Sliding behind the wheel of his classic, candy apple red, 1961 Ford Thunderbird, Rumlow dug out the pack of cigarettes from his coat pocket and angrily tapped one out.  When he turned to offer one to Rollins in the passenger seat, he noticed the other man’s assessing gaze.

 

“What’s with you tonight?” he asked.  The scar that ran from the corner of his mouth down the right side of his chin twisted with his frown. 

 

Rumlow took his time lighting his cigarette, settling in the seat as he took a long, deep drag.  “Sitwell wants to come out with us tonight,” he said when he finally exhaled. 

 

Tin-Tin groaned his displeasure from the back seat.  All Rollins could muster was a harshly whispered, “Fuck.” 

 

“Yeah, that about sums things up perfectly.” Rumlow offered no further comment as he turned the key over in the ignition and the engine roared to life.

 

Tin-Tin leaned forward, resting his arms on the backs of the two front seats.  “After the cluster-fuck that happened last year, the big boss is gonna let him come out and play again?”

 

“You want to be the one to tell the boss he can’t come?” Rumlow responded purposely exhaling smoke into the other man’s face.

 

Tin-Tin held his hands up in surrender and slinked back into his seat.  He knew better than to question orders even if they meant putting his own ass on the line.  He just didn’t want to be around that sicko any more than was absolutely necessary.  He knew that feeling was shared by his companions and given their line of work, that was saying a lot.

 

“Can we stop off at The Pit before we go?” Soft-spoken Rollins asked.  When Rumlow looked over at him, he added, “I’m going to need a little chemical refreshment to get through this night.”

 

Rumlow smirked.  “Can’t argue that,” he said as he pulled the car away from the curb and drove off into the night.

 

 

~*~

 

  

 

 Having no idea what the actual time was, it struck James as a little strange that the streets were mostly empty.  The city came alive after dark.  The occasional car that did drive by didn’t seem too inclined to stay any longer than it had to.  Most of the buildings they went past were dark and abandoned.  The ones that weren’t didn’t exactly scream of welcome. 

 

He tripped in a pothole full of dirty rain water and nearly fell flat on his face while crossing the street.  When did he lose his shoes?  Did he even have them to start with?  And where were they going?  The crow kept leading him through a never-ending labyrinth of back alleys and side streets.  Nothing looked familiar. 

 

//We’re here.//

James looked up at the derelict building.  The heavy mahogany front door was water damaged and attached only by the bottom hinge.  Yellow police tape tied to the doorknob fluttered in the slight breeze.  Near the roof was a large, Gothic rose window.  Most of the glass was gone, though a few of the panes around the outer circle were intact.  The crow flew inside the foyer and cawed for him to follow.

 

He was instantly filled with a sense of dread.  This was home?  It became increasingly familiar the longer he stood there.  Almost like a memory of a dream you can barely remember upon waking.  There was a large sign driven into the small patch of dirt to the right of the main path.  It read:

 

**Future site of The Commonwealth Condominiums.  A Pierce Industries Property.**

 

It sent an icy shiver down his back.  Something about that name made him feel uneasy.  He looked down towards the ground and saw tied to one of the posts a bouquet of dead flowers.  A memorial?  For who?  From the darkness of the hallway, the crow cawed again.

 

“Yeah, yeah, I’m coming.”

 

Inside the foyer smelled like a combination of old newspapers and wet dog.  The front door had remained open through many storms judging from the water damage and swollen wood.  The place was utterly abandoned.  Its inhabitants long gone.  Left in a hurry from the looks of it too.  As James walked down the long hallway and rounded the staircase to the floors above, a few of the apartment doors had been left open.  From the sparse light from outside he could see pieces of furniture and belongings where their owners had left them.  Not even thieves had bothered to come in and see what was left.  As he reached the landing of the second floor, his curiosity had the better of him and he opened the closest door.  The walls were bare, but the couch in the living room remained.   On the floor were a few children’s toys left behind in the chaos.  A stuffed rabbit with one ear half torn off stared at him forlornly from its place near the front door.

 

Hector…and his wife Isabella?  No, Inez.  They lived here with their two daughters.  The apartment was way too small for all of them, but they were so happy to have their own place, they didn’t mind.  If he closed his eyes, he could almost picture them.

 

He backed out of the apartment and kept moving up to the next level.  Something very bad had happened here.  He stopped dead in his tracks when he reached the final staircase to the penthouse.  The door was crisscrossed with a giant X of police tape.  There was a skeleton Halloween decoration still taped to it. 

 

_Happy Halloween, Buck!  Like what I’ve done to the place?_

James felt as through a vice was squeezing his chest.  His knees threatened to give out at the memory of Steve’s voice and he had to grab the banister with this clawed arm to keep from falling down.  The talons left deep gouges in their wake.  He regained his composure and dragged his body up the last few steps.  The door was naturally unlocked and the police tape gave way easily when he pushed the door inward.  A rush of frigid air was the first thing to greet him from the broken rose window.  It had started raining at some point in his journey up to the apartment.  Standing a few steps inside, James surveyed the complete and utter destruction of the home he and Steve had shared.

 

What had once been a fairly well-kept studio apartment now looked like a war zone.  The drawers on the dresser had all been pulled out and tossed.  The contents carelessly strewn about the room.  Shelves were cleared of all the various knickknacks he and Steve had accumulated over their time together. The glass water globe of the Grand Canyon was in pieces on the hardwood floor.  James bought that on their honeymoon because it was Steve’s lifelong dream to visit there.  Anything that was glass had been smashed.  Even the Steve’s drafting table had not been spared.  It looked like someone had taken an axe to it.  All the precious tubes of paint had been squeezed out and splattered all over the walls and floors as if in tribute to Jackson Pollack.    

 

The queen sized bed took up most of the real estate in the apartment.  The sheets had been stripped off, most likely taken away for evidence, but there were still large red-brown stains soaked into the mattress.  Blood.

 

Steve.   

 

The crow flew in behind him and perched itself on the high-backed chair to the left of the window.

 

//Hey.  Be careful what you touch in here.//

No sooner had the voice echoed inside his head when the first flash came.

 

_“Housing authority!” A well-built, stocky man with short, spiky, jet-black hair said as he kicked in the apartment door.  He was holding up a piece of paper.  Steve back-peddled hard and fell right down on his ass.  Before he could manage to get back on his feet again, two other men moved swiftly into the room and hauled him roughly up onto his feet._

A wave of intense vertigo brought James down to his knees clutching the sides of his head.  The shock of the vision was a fiery knife slicing through his brain.  More flashes came rapidly after that.

 

_The dark-haired man drew his arm back and punched Steve in the face hard enough that the two men holding him had to struggle to keep him upright.  Another man entered the apartment.  He was bald and wore wire rimmed glasses.  He was carrying an axe.  “Take him over to the bed,” he said looked down at Steve with a predatory grin._

“NO!” James screamed, stumbling and half-crawling to try and escape what he was seeing.  But he remembered this.  He remembered walking in on this scene. 

 

_It was late.  His band had been playing at one of the local clubs.  The set ended sometime after two in the morning.  He could hear a commotion from the apartment as he went up the stairs.  While it wasn’t unusual for Steve to wait up for him, he was never this loud about it.  He knew something was wrong the moment he saw that the door was cracked open._

_James first noticed the two men gleefully throwing all their earthly possessions around like kids in a pile of leaves.  Then he saw Steve on the bed.  There was another man on top of him, pressing him face down into the mattress.  He was…he was…_

_Steve looked up and met his eyes.  Most of his face was covered in blood and bruises with one eye completely swollen shut. His expression was one of absolute, soul crushing misery._

_An animal noise rose in James’s throat and he dropped his guitar case as he began to lunge at the man on top of Steve.  He made it one, maybe two steps, before there was a searing pain in his chest.  He looked down to find three inches of knife handle sticking out of him just below his collarbone.  He staggered backwards dumbfounded._

_“Bullseye!” the dark-skinned man with the dreadlocks cheered._

Back in reality, James sat on the floor next to the bed, panting heavily as if he had just ran a marathon.  He scrubbed away tears with the back of his right hand.  How could this be?  How did this happen?

 

//Don’t look.  I think you’ve had enough.//

 

The crow’s tone was warning, but carried a certain amount of empathy with it.  James didn’t care.  He needed to know what happened to them…to Steve.  He placed his palm flat against the floorboards and concentrated.  The inky black pull of memories came up over him once again.  Far away, he could hear the crow screaming in the background noise of his mind.

 

//DON”T LOOK!  DON”T LOOK!//

_The one with the spiky, black hair whistled loudly.  “Time to get a move on, boys.”  He stared down at James as he writhed on the floor in pain._

_“I’m not done here yet,” the bald one on the bed sneered._

_“I don’t give a fuck.  Your little perverted adventure cost us valuable time.  Someone’s probably called the cops by now.  We need to not be here when they arrive, Sitwell.  I don’t care what kind of clout you have with the boss, but he sure as shit ain’t gonna bail your ass out of jail.”_

_The man called Sitwell backed up off of Steve and for one brief moment James could see the relief in his lover’s expression.  But that quickly turned to horror as the stout man adjusted his glasses and retrieved his axe from the side of the bed._

_“No…Buck,” Steve moaned weakly as if sensing something worse was about to happen._

_The two other men who had been watching came up behind their axe-wielding friend until they formed a semi-circle around James._

_“No witnesses, right Rumlow?” the one with the facial scars asked.  He pulled a 9mm from an armpit holster.  “They’ve seen too much.”_

_“Shit,” Rumlow hissed.  “Yeah…fucking…yeah.  Do it.”  He jabbed his finger into Sitwell’s face.  “This is on you.”_

_The barrel of the gun seemed to train on James’s head painfully slow.  In a last ditch effort at living, he propelled himself up as if he could dive out of the way of the bullet.  All he succeeded in doing was changing a headshot into a chest shot.  The breath left his lungs and he staggered backwards a few steps, but managed to keep his footing.  The scarred man seemed to be just as surprised as he was for a moment before firing off another round.  This time he fell back against the giant rose window and glass gave away easily under his weight, but the wrought iron took an extra few seconds to buckle.  In any other circumstance, the backflip over the rail he performed that allowed him to grab the bottom edge of the window with his left hand would have been amazing.  However, it was all just wasted effort._

_“Holy fuck!” the one with the dreadlocks shouted as he looked down at the bizarre scene.  “This is some Cirque Du Soleil shit right here.”_

_James didn’t care.  He couldn’t hear what they were saying.  Despite the agony in his chest from the bullet wounds and the knife still sticking out of his shoulder, he had to pull himself back up and get to Steve.  He managed to wrap his elbow around one of the stronger iron bars in an effort to haul himself up enough so that he could reach up with his right hand._

_A loud, thick crunch sounded over the wind roaring in his ears.  He looked up to the maniacal grin of the man with the glasses and the axe imbedded in his left upper arm.  It didn’t even hurt as the other man yanked it back out and brought it back down in the same spot.  The bone gave way with another loud snap and James, well he knew what came after this part._

//I told you not to look.  It’s too much to handle all in one shot.//

 

The crow regarded him from its perch on the chair with something akin to disappointment. 

 

“I think I’m gonna puke,” James gasped.  All of the fear mixed with guilt still washed over him in waves as the visions receded.  Lingering and raw like freshly abraded skin. 

 

//Now that would be an amazing feat since you’re technically not alive.// 

 

James steadfastly ignored that comment and curled his knees up under his chin to stare despondently at the gouges his clawed hand left in the wood floor.  Steve was dead.  They had killed him.  They beat him and terrorized him and when that wasn’t enough, they raped him too.  And in that moment of painful clarity, a rage began to burn fierce in his soul so intense that it would leave nothing behind in its wake.  

 

//Now you’re beginning to understand what you have to do.//

 

“I want them all to pay for what they did to us.”

 

He could feel, almost see, the crow smile in his mind’s eye.

 

//Good.  It’s time to get to work.  I’ll be your eyes and ears.//

 

James stood and regarded himself.  He was both shirtless and shoeless, dressed in nothing but a pair of suit pants.  This wouldn’t do at all.  The crow gave a questioning cock of his head.  “If you’re gonna fight a war, you’ve got to wear a uniform.”

 

If the crow were capable of smirking, it would have.  The apartment was in shambles, but James managed to dig out of the rubble a pair of black cargo pants, a skin tight black neoprene shirt, and a serviceable pair of steel-tipped boots.   James’s bandmates used to joke about him dressing like a Goth soldier.  As he pulled the shirt over his head, something reflecting the streetlight caught his eye.  Upon closer inspection, he discovered one of the porcelain masks Steve had made for the masquerade ball they were going to have to celebrate their first anniversary.  They were a matched set, Drama and Comedy.  Steve had spent weeks sculpting and decorating them by hand.  He’d even cast them out of molds he took of their faces so they would fit perfectly. 

 

The frowning face of Drama stared back at him while in his mind he saw flashes of Steve, body ravaged by yet another cold, seated by his desk, working diligently.  There was a blanket draped over his bony shoulders while his delicate piano fingers painted swirls and vine-like flourishes with amazing precision.  James caressed the mask with his own calloused fingers before curling his clawed hand into a fist and slamming it into the closest wall. 

 

There was makeup.  Yes, if he remembered correctly there was some stage makeup that he wore if the band was feeling theatrical in the old vanity table.  James practically cackled with glee when he pulled open the drawer and found it right where he left it.  The mirror was smashed, but still provided enough of a view for James to smear the white grease paint all over his face.  He carefully smudged black around his eyes to mimic the Drama mask Steve intended for him to wear, but instead of painting a frown on his lips, he painted an almost grotesque grin over his lips that extended to the apple of his cheeks.  Steve had always joked that he was sometimes too serious for his own good.

 

When he was finished, he left the mask on the vanity went to stand in front of the broken window.  While he surveyed the city below, the crow landed on his shoulder.

 

//Your anger is a gift.  Remember that.  Ready?//

 

“Let’s go.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> So, I really have no excuse for taking a year to update this. Life and all that good stuff. I hope it was worth the wait. Next times, vengeance will come and we'll meet a few more familiar faces.


End file.
